1. Field of the Invention
This invention concerns a propulsion device for propelling vehicles. More particularly, the invention concerns a gyroscopic propulsion device.
2. General Discussion of the Background
It has long been recognized that gyroscopic devices could provide propulsion for a vehicle. Examples of such propulsion devices are shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,555,915; German Pat. No. 28 25 490; and French Pat. Nos. 1,024,328 and 2,293,608. Each of these devices rotates a first body about a primary axis and a set of secondary bodies about a secondary axis perpendicular to the primary axis. Essentially, these devices imitate the precession of four, radially connected spinning tops. The inventors of these previous devices did not understand that as a top attempts to maintain its level of its precession, it presses down on its tip. In these previous devices, a downward force is exerted at the center of the mechanism, which counterbalances the upward gyroscopic effect produced by the spinning bodies. In U.S. Pat. No. 3,555,915, the swinging action of the dumbbells of Young's gyroscopic device are not mechanically restrained. Therefore, those weights acquire positions in which the forces are balanced and no net force can be imparted to the gyroscopic device, not even from the shift of the centers of the dumbbells' combined masses upward. All that upward shift can do is either hinder the rotation around axis 10 if both rotations are counterclockwise or clockwise, or aid rotation about axis 10 if one rotation is clockwise and the other is counterclockwise.
The principle of gyroscopic propulsion can be understood by considering a top or gyroscope, which is a spinning body that rotates about an axis of rotation. When a force, such as gravity, is exerted on the body in such a way that it tends to change the direction of the axis of rotation, the body precesses in a direction perpendicular to the plane which contains the axis of rotation and the applied force. The gravitational center of the top moves on a more or less horizontal circle, hence almost perpendicular to the gravitational force which initiated the precession.
It is an object of this invention to harness, as opposed to imitating, the induced precession of a spinning body to propel a vehicle.
It is yet another object of the invention to provide a propulsion generator which is highly efficient.
It is yet another object of the invention to provide a propulsion generator which is useful in terrestial and aquatic.